Snakes in Paradise...

Snakes in Paradise... There's one poisonous snake here, a particularly docile and low-toxicity rattlesnake called the Great Basin Rattlesnake. We haven't seen any of these yet, but we're not worried about them as they're amongst the least aggressive and lowest venom toxicity of all rattlesnakes – pretty much the opposite of what we were dealing with in Jamul, California. However, I have see four snakes here – all different, all small (about pencil diameter and 10" to 12" long). I haven't identified any of them, though one of them I'm pretty sure was a garter snake. One of these was on the shore of Porcupine Reservoir; the others in our yard, spotted while I was mowing. It's interesting that all last year, even with all the outdoors work I did, I never saw a snake. Now in the first few days outside this spring, I've already seen four.